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General discussion

Need Help on Print Server

Jun 8, 2005 11:46PM PDT

I asked this question before but I need some further help. I bought a print server (Hawking HPS1U) to allow my wife to print from her Dell Inspiron laptop. She hooks up to our DSL from the SMC router. I attached everything the way the manual said to. Printer USB to print server, print server to router, loaded the software. But now I get message on my desktop that it can't find the print server. Now here's the dumb question, should my desktop be attached to the router? I am not at home now but I believe our DSL line is attached to the router and desktop separately. Sorry if this is a dumb question!

Discussion is locked

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when you get back home...
Jun 9, 2005 12:20AM PDT

please check and tell us more about how your desktop unit is connected to the DSL. In theory, the laptop, the desktop, and the print server must all be connected to the same router (wired or wireless). It is the router and it's internal switch that makes your home network. If your desktop somehow connects to the DSL before the router, then the desktop is not part of the household network, it's an independent system that merely happens to have shared access to the DSL signal. Until you can tell us more about your network configuration, it's difficult to suggest why you aren't able to reach the new print server.

dw

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Print Server problems
Jun 9, 2005 2:56AM PDT

I believe that the router is connected to the desktop and also wirelessly to my wife's laptop. I am a little confused as to why, after running the server software, ''No print server found'' shows on my desktop. Everything is connected correctly.

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the saga of the lost server..
Jun 9, 2005 5:27AM PDT

Reading between the lines here... you haven't yet achieved any connectivity to the print server at all. You haven't even tried on the wireless laptop, but you have loaded all the Hawking utilities on the desktop and then it couldn't find the server. The first thing I would start looking at is the cabling and connections. You've presumably got a good cable and connection between your desktop and the router - you can get to the internet. Leave that alone. That leaves us with the cable to the print server. Make sure it has power and then unplug and replug the network cable and both ends to be certain it is well seated in the socket. Watch the little LED link lights on the router to see if the router recognizes the presence of a piece of network hardware on the other end of that wire. If the link light doesn't blink on and off as you plug and unplug the cable, there is a bad connection. Try it in a different port of the router or try a different cable. Once you get a good electrical connection to the server, the setup should proceed correctly. If it still doesn't detect, you may have a defective device.

dw

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still having problem
Jun 16, 2005 6:03AM PDT

I bought a new cable but my desktop still cannot find the print server when it runs through the Hawkins Print Utility program. I was wondering if that maybe our wireless router is only for the internet, is that possible? May be a stupid question, sorry! Also, the cable I am using fits okay but I am wondering if it is not a ethernet cable. Is that what I need? Also does it matter where (of the four slots in the back of the router) I connect the cable.

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cables...
Jun 16, 2005 6:51AM PDT

An ethernet cable and a phone cable look similar from a distance, but are different up close. Ethernet is usually round, not flat, and a little thicker than phone wire. The ethernet connector is a little wider (8 little brass nubs visible on the end) than a phone cable connector (only 2 or 4 little brass nubs), and as a result a phone connector will go into the ethernet jack, but it will be wobbly and loose. An ethernet connector won't fit into a phone jack at all.

There are two kinds of ethernet cable - straight through and cross over. Cross over is used only rarely, and you'd have to specifically ask for it in the store, so you probably didn't pick up one of those by mistake. So let's assume for a moment you got the right kind of ethernet cable.

The router should have 5 ethernet jacks on the back. One would be marked "WAN" and is where the cable modem connects in. The other 4 ports are together. The ethernet cable from your desktop system is plugged into one of them. If you look at the front of the router while unplugging and replugging that cable from your desktop, you should see one of the little LED lights blink off and on in concert with your plugging. That is the "link" indicator, by which the router is signalling that it detects a network device on the other end of that port.

The new ethernet cable to the print server can be plugged into any of the other 3 jacks. When you plug it in (and the print server is powered on and the other end of the ethernet cable plugged into it), you should see on the front of the router another LED blink on. Again, this signals a good connection to a network device somewhere at the other end of that cable. If you are not getting the link LED on the router to blink on, you are missing connectivity at all. That could be a bad cable or a bad port on the router (in which case try moving it to one of the other jacks on the router), or a defective print server. Check that the print server is properly powered up - does it have any sort of little red power LED? If you still don't have basic connectivity to the print server, you'll have to deal with Hawking or your store to get a warranty replacement.

dw

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I didn't see that you actually install
Jun 16, 2005 7:40AM PDT

the printer server driver yet...

If you already install, what IP address the printer server get?

Can you go to the web based utility of the printer server?

Did you follow the printer server installation procedure - before connecting to the printer?

Tips: Use Wired connection in doing all the configuration.